Fred McCaleb
Economics always plays a large part in the life of any people, and
the early days it was next to impossible for a frontier family to buy
ready----made goods. In the first place, thely had little or no money; and
secondly they , they had no market from which to buy. Four or five pounds of
coffe could be bought for one dollar. The price of cloth was extremely high,
with brown domestic selling for 34 to 37 cents a yard and calico selling for
50 to 75 cents a yard.
` Prices like these forced the early settlers to make their own clothing, and
the homespun with which to make them. The following is an account of the way
one family.
My grandmother Hollingsworth had eleven girls and two boys. During the war
between the states, my grandmother Hollingsworth took a square black oilcloth
and fashioned a raincappe for her husband, lining it with jeans she made from
wool cut from their own sheep. She spun thread from the wool, dyed it brown
with the leaves and hulls from the walnut tree. This dye she brewed in a
washpot,and it made a dark brown color. She also made a grey dye by mixing the
brown with indigo. The family grew the indigo in the garden. They also grew
the madder plant, which produced red dye. From the swamps they gathered leaves
from the laurel trees to make yellow dye. Copperas was also used for dying the
thread brown. Sumac leaves were used for making black dye. Thread was spun on a
home made spinning wheel, and was wound by a reed into a hawk. Four cuts were in
a hawk. This made a yard. Petticoats, called balmorals, were made from two
widths of cloth, vari colored and with a dark border.
Grandmother said that she and her daughters(11 in number!) made clothes and
shoes for her husband and two sons in the war. They killed the animals, removed
the hair with lye from the ashes, and tanned the hides for the shoes. They
soaked the leather for days in a large vat in the ground, using red oak ooze
for the tanning process.Then the spread out the skins and rubbed and rubbed
them to soften them. Calf skins were used for making soles of the shoes. Tiny
blocks of maple were made into pegs to tack the soles to the shoes. These tacks
were sharpened at one end. A pegging awl was used for making holes in the soles
for the tacks to be driven in.
Grandma and the girls knitted socks and underwear, and made a suit and a pair
of clothes each to send to their menfolk in the war. When they heard the
Yankees were coming, they took two boards off the wall of the piazzo and hid
the clothes underneath until after the soldiers were gone.
Mrs Connell related another interesting incident. Her grandmother
Hollingsworth, who had been accustomed to cooking on an open hearth fire, was
approached with the idea of getting one of those new – fangled stoves. She
was quick to make the reply. “Wouldn’t have one of those stoves__too much
like childs play.” In passing we might add that
settled near the base of it.
This must have been related to the Hollingsworth that married a Ford man. I saw
the remnants of what was left at the John R Hollingsworth house. There was a
spinning wheel and loom up stairs and maybe other things. Had a round table to
eat on. You could spin it and get what you wamted. His son Jim and wife Mandy
Kelly were in house at that time. Jim had a blacksmith shop out back and could
make most anything
Including a still to make whiskey. He also made fishtraps. My mother’s
grandfather Eason didn’t like cornbread cooked anywhere but on fireplace. My
mother told me that. What would they think now?
Last paragraph written by Fred McCaleb
